Monday, August 26, 2013

My Decision to Serve a Mission

My decision to serve a mission is kind of hard to explain... because I haven't always wanted to serve a mission, but I have always had that feeling that a mission is where I need to be. My only question was when would this happen? Would it be when I get older, or when I'm 21 (now 19), or maybe Heavenly Father had a different mission in mind for me.

My plan has always been to go to school and go "man hunting" and if i wasn't able to find the right man by the time I was 21, then I would go on a mission.

But then President Monson's big announcement of the age change completely threw me off guard. Don't get me wrong, because I was super excited that The Work was hastening, but I had no clue as to what to do with my life and whether or not I was supposed to be part of that now, or later. My life was thrown way out of whack! I couldn't think straight, my grades started dropping, I needed some serious help, so I turned to God.

I remember asking him "should I go on a mission... or should I stay home and continue school and searching for my future husband?" The answer that he have me was "You don't need to know right now." You can imagine my utter frustration. But that soon passed and I got to thinking, maybe if I don't need to know today, but what about tomorrow, or the next day or the next? So, I continued to pray.

During that time of I don't really know what I'm going to do with my life, I had a friend come up to me and they told me that I should just make the decision and then ask God if it's right. I thought, that's a good idea and all, but I would much rather have Heavenly Father tell me what I need to do so that I don't screw up my life. Then another friend told me the exact same thing, to make the decision and then ask God if it's right because that's what she did and it worked great for her. So I figured I should look into this a little deeper. One day I remember coming across D&C9:7-9 "(7)behold, you have not understood; you have supposed that I would give it unto you when you took no thought save it was to ask me. (8)But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right. (9) But if it be not right you should have no such feelings, but you shall have a stupor of thought that shall cause you to forget the thing which is wrong;"

Right then I knew that I needed to make the decision. So I started thinking about me as a missionary and where I could be just shortly down the road in school. I weighed all of my pros ans cons and decided that I should go on a mission.

I remember praying to my Heavenly Father that night and I told him that I'm going to serve a mission. I then got the most overwhelming feeling, and I knew that going on a mission was the right thing for me to do.